Business Notebook

On the same day Boeing Co. announced it will build the 787-10 exclusively in North Charleston, the local factory dismissed some contract laborers hired earlier this year to help with production problems on the Dreamliner’s smaller models.

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A spokeswoman declined to specify the number of workers let go. The company regularly uses experienced contract labor to supplement its work force while ramping up production rates to maintain stable operations, she said.

Last winter, the North Charleston site that fully assembles the 787-8 and makes parts for the 787-9 brought in hundreds of temporary laborers, or contract workers, to help fill a backlog of unfinished work in the midbody fuselage assembly area.

CresCom Bank buys 13 First Community Bank branches

CresCom Bank has entered into a definitive agreement to buy 13 branches of First Community Bank of Bluefield, Va. Six of the branches are located in Brunswick County, N.C., and three are in South Carolina, including one each in Conway and Little River.

The bank paid about $7 million for the branches, said Jerry Rexroad, CEO of Carolina Financial Corp., which owns CresCom. CresCom operates primarily along the Grand Strand and in Charleston. Upon completion of the transaction, CresCom is expected to have approximately $1.3 billion in assets, $700 million on loans and $1 billion in deposits.

More developers interested in Port Royal port

The number of developers publicly showing interest in the Port of Port Royal property tripled Wednesday night. Town Council met in a closed door session with a group that included representatives of the team of Chaffin-Light and The Furman Co. to discuss a contractual matter related to the property.

While that was going on inside Town Hall, broker and developer Whit Suber spoke outside the building about months of negotiations among Lowcountry Investments, LLC, which he represents, and the S.C. State Ports Authority, the property’s owner. They join Dick Stewart of 303 Associates, who made an offer Thursday to purchase part of the land for $4 million.

The port has been vacant since 2004, when it was deemed too expensive to operate. The Ports Authority was ordered to sell the land, but three attempts since 2006 have fallen through.

Nation & World

Fed: Quarter of U.S. households ‘just getting by’

A quarter of U.S. households say they’re “just getting by” financially, a survey by the Federal Reserve shows. The Fed issued the first-time report Thursday, describing it as a snapshot of how Americans perceive their financial and economic well-being. The survey of about 4,100 households was conducted from Sept. 17 through Oct. 4, 2013.

Thirteen percent said they were struggling to get by, and 34 percent reported they were somewhat worse off or much worse off than before the Great Recession hit in 2008. Other findings: a third of those who had applied for credit in the previous 12 months said they were turned down or given less than they requested, and 24 percent had some type of education debt.

Thirty-one percent of people who aren’t retired said they had no retirement savings or pension, including 19 percent of those aged 55 to 64. Nearly half of adults weren’t actively thinking about financial planning for retirement, with 25 percent saying they had done no planning at all.

The (Charleston) Post and Courier, The (Myrtle Beach) Sun News, The (Hilton Head) Island Packet and The Associated Press contributed.